Will Megyn Kelly Defend Westboro Church Members If They Picket Lafayette Funerals?

Louisiana governor Bobby Jindal has promised to arrest Westboro Baptist Church members if they picket the funerals of those slain in a Lafayette, Louisiana movie theater last week. But will Megyn Kelly defend the picketers the way she did when she used them to defend Pamela Geller’s anti-Muhammad stunt in Texas?

On Face The Nation yesterday, Jindal said about the Westboro Baptist Church's threat to picket the funerals, “Let me be very clear. If they come here to Louisiana, they try to disrupt this funeral, we’re going to lock them up. We’re going to arrest them. They shouldn’t try that in Louisiana. We won’t abide by that here.”

MEGYN KELLY: Why don’t you go back and look at what Westboro Baptist Church—you had your say and now I will respond.

The decision issued in 2011, 8-1, a nearly unanimous Supreme Court, liberals and conservatives joining together, saying that notwithstanding the fact that the Westboro Baptist Church, as hateful as they come, hurtful, and speech which did not contribute hardly at all to the public discourse. Negligible value. Nonetheless, free speech still supported allowing them to do it.

RICHARD FOWLER: I’m not condoning the Westboro Baptist Church. I hate them just as much as I hate this group.

MEGYN KELLY: The more offensive the speech is Richard, the more protection it needs. That is how the first amendment works.

If Jindal does try to arrest the Westboro protesters, will Kelly call him out for trying to stop free speech? Will she stand up for the Westboro Baptist Church protesters’ free speech rights the same way she stood up for Geller’s ?

Showing 7 reactions

Westboro DOES have a “right” to protest ANY funeral—public OR private. The Supreme Court (March 2011, in an 8-1 ruling; Alito was the lone dissenter) effectively further showed that “the First Amendment exists to protect robust debate on public issues and free expression, no matter how distasteful.” (bolding mine for emphasis) (You can read more about this at http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/03/02/westboro-baptist-church-w_n_830209.html . The funeral in question was a PRIVATE funeral

Your read on Jindal’s threat to arrest the Westboro folk is also wrong, mj. The police (which, actually, Jindal has no say over; the state’s National Guard, on the other hand……….) exist to keep the public order. It’s up to them to provide protection for the Westboro protesters (no matter how distasteful the cops may view the job—as we’ve been pointing out about the marriage license clerks who’ve pulled the “religious exemption” card at gay/lesbian couples, their job is NOT to allow their personal feelings get in the way of doing their legal duties and obligations*) and to keep any counter-demonstrators from attacking the WBC folk. Threatening to arrest someone “to keep the public order” is an egregious threat that actually comes close to the level of impeachable offenses. The mere threat of arresting anyone for exercising their First Amendment rights—no matter how despicable you find the group—is little different from the days of Bull Conner siccing police dogs and blasting firehoses on civil rights demonstrators.

I harbor absolutely zero love for Westboro. As far as I’m concerned, I want an F5 tornado to hit their damned church building while the ENTIRE family/congregation is inside, and I want not a single person survive (no matter how “innocent” the person may be—yes, I’m including the kids, regardless of age, to suffer as well; that’s how much I hate WBC). That said………….they have as much right to protest anyone or anything—public or private—as those KKKers and Neo-Nazis who gathered in South Carolina to support that traitorous flag (or as the KKK did when they marched through the middle of the Jewish community of Skokie, IL back in the late 1970s).

Yes. Free speech does have limits. Unfortunately, PEACEFUL protesting—no matter the source—is NOT among those limits. See, Aria—that’s where your own analysis failed. Westboro has NEVER—not once—crossed the line in their protests. Hell, half the family are lawyers; they know how far they can take things and how far they can push. Their words are vile and the protests they’ve done are really reprehensible (to say “poor taste” is a gross understatement) BUT they’ve committed no crimes.

On the topic of “not doing your job because of your ‘sincerely-held religious beliefs’,” I know I’ve mentioned before that I work for the Postal Service. You can’t imagine how much utter right-wing crap I see passing through on a daily basis. And as much as I would love to express my “sincerely-held (though not religious) beliefs” with regard to the lies and misinformation being passed through the Service every single day, I don’t because doing so would be a Federal offense. Not only would I lose my job (not even the Union could protect me in this case) but I’d face serious fines and possible jail time for tampering with or obstructing the mail (hell, technically it’s illegal to read postcards, but you know human nature). Even if I tried to defend my actions as being a public service (I *did take an oath to defend my country against ALL enemies—both foreign and domestic—and, my “sincerely-held beliefs” hold that groups like the American Center for Law and Justice and PACs supporting right-wing politicians are effectively domestic enemies), it wouldn’t do any good. I’d be out of a job.

“The more offensive the speech is Richard, the more protection it needs. That is how the first amendment works.”

No, Megyn. It isn’t. The 1st Amendment doesn’t protect violations of obscenity laws. Just like it doesn’t protect death threats, defamation, harassment, or malicious actions trying to pass themselves off as free speech.

Exactly, Aria.

Add to this the fact that Amendment I of the USC only guarantees that the GOVERNMENT shall not interfere with free speech — the funerals in Lafayette are a private event not sponsored by any government, thus Westboro has no legitimate “right” to disrupt them.

Its times like this I have to wonder if these rightwingnuts ever actually READ the Constitution they claim they so revere.

As for Piyush’s threat to arrest the Westboro protestors if they picket the funerals, I’d argue that he’s not so much infringing on their free speech rights, as he is ensuring that citizens are protected from outside agitators, which is his job as Louisiana’s Chief Executive/chief law enforcement officer . . .

“The more offensive the speech is Richard, the more protection it needs. That is how the first amendment works.”

No, Megyn. It isn’t. The 1st Amendment doesn’t protect violations of obscenity laws. Just like it doesn’t protect death threats, defamation, harassment, or malicious actions trying to pass themselves off as free speech.

That’s why TV/radio stations can be fined.

That’s why hosts and bloggers can be sued for defamation.

That’s why protestors can be arrested for criminal actions in their demonstrations.

That’s why the authorities are keeping tabs on some of your viewers for what they posted on Fox Nation.

I’ve said repeatedly that I don’t see Megyn Kelly as a real lawyer. Yes, she was a litigator, and yes she was with the DA’s office before that, but I have never seen someone who gets it so wrong when it’s not in the script. She shows super awesome lawyer powers when she’s doing those clearly scripted cred building smackdowns of another host, like those ones where O’Reilly’s smirking like “I got a clip to prove the tagline,” then you see her in videos like this…

A fourth grader knows what I posted. But saying that Kelly doesn’t is actually the version that makes her look better, as the evidence builds up that if she does… She doesn’t care. Because in the don’t care version, she’ll cite the examption statues in an oscar-worthy show of perfect verbatim if Westboro tries this with, say, the funeral of George HW Bush, but for something like LaFayette, it’s “Yeah, taste not law!”.

Translation: Fuck your rights if you ain’t on my good side!

I still maintain that I would like to see transcripts (or better, a video) of her in court. Just because I have to see what kinda lawyer she really was.

Megyn won’t attack WBC unless there’s a way to blame President Obama. That being said, I’m sure she could come up with a way that somehow President Obama is to blame for the WBC’s protests, or even their existence. Stay tuned!

Jindal’s just grandstanding, but—a bit ironically—Westboro’s people would LOVE to be arrested. Then they simply pull out their “First Amendment” defense and sue the pants off Louisiana and, more likely than not, Jindal personally.

And win.

And win BIG. Thus ending Jindal’s entire political career (he’s term-limited as Governor but other offices are still available—like US Senator). Even if Jindal manages to settle with Westboro, he’s sunk. No one likes Westboro, but even the most die-hard of religious rightist Louisianan won’t trust someone who actually DID impinge on another religious group’s freedoms.